Happy 40th Birthday, Jim Dear

I like to imagine God knitting you together.
Connecting bone and sinew.
Thinking of me. Thinking of them.

I'm sure I would've been your friend
in second or fifth grade,
but when (just past half-forty!) I met you,
I didn't trust our hum and spark.

I almost grieve the time lost,
sometimes, between you and you,
but would walk across broken glass
for him, and it wasn't bad as that.



Nor was it good as this: you, my rock

of the anchoring, not sinking, variety.

The way your eyes convey forever.

The way your hands beg right now.



(Happy 40th Birthday, Jim Dear. Love, Darling.)